Robert L. Park and Ursula Goodenough

Robert L. Park is a professor of physics at the University of Maryland at College Park. Ursula Goodenough is a professor of biology at Washington University in St. Louis. In the following viewpoint, Park and Goodenough contend that the federal government's creation of the Office of Alternative Medicine at the National Institutes of Health has fostered the mistaken belief among both physicians and laypeople that alternative treatments are viable. The authors maintain that there is still no scientific evidence to support the use of alternative therapies and that these therapies may actually be dangerous if they supplant necessary medical treatment for severe illness.

As you read, consider the following questions:

1. What criticisms do the authors level against the National Institutes of Health's Office of Alternative Medicine?
2. According to Park and Goodenough, why do health...